Happy Mother’s Day

It being Friday afternoon and almost Shabbat, I'm leaving a brief Mother's Day greeting now.  First, to say thank you to my kids for letting me be their mom and being such wonderful sons.  Then to my husband for being my partner in crime.

But I also need to talk about my own mother, whose standards were high, whose generosity to others was boundless and who had a huge influence on so many.  She was an art teacher – elementary school – and not a kid in our community would have been inside a museum if my mom hadn't taken them.  Since she grew up in the Depression and World War II, she was very much part of the Greatest Generation – in every way.

She treated everyone like someone worth meeting, and listening to, and people knew it.  All my friends wrote to me when she died with some personal remembrance.  I lost her when both boys were in college, and I remember thinking so many times how much I would have loved to be able to ask her about having adult kids.  How was she able to stay out of the middle of our lives when she had such a strong opinion about how we should be living them?  Why did she let me hang around with the high school bad boys – even let them sleep in our basement when they were fighting with their parents, without worrying what influence they might have had over us?  How did she feel as we got married?  Was she as nervous as I am now?

I do know though that, whatever her answers would be, and despite some daughterly issues, her faith in us, her encouragement, her belief that we needed careers and missions of our own all empowered us to become the women we are.  She was very private and there are many things I wish I knew, and others I wish I could have told her, but they were not the center of things – just things.

She was a great mom.  I miss her.  And I'm so grateful that I do.